


tonight the foxes hunt the hounds

by larkgrace



Category: The Kane Chronicles - Rick Riordan
Genre: Alternate Universe - Superheroes/Superpowers, F/M, social justice superheroes YEEEEAH BUDDY, these poor losers get stuck with the worst superhero names ever
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-12-26
Updated: 2014-12-26
Packaged: 2018-03-03 17:18:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,661
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2858762
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/larkgrace/pseuds/larkgrace
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Whatever was left of Carter’s focus goes out the window through his next three classes, and his Physics teacher actually asks him if he needs to go to the nurse, with a concerned little “You’re looking peaky, dear!” He can’t think of a delicate way to tell her that he’s probably gone into shock because in the last twenty-four hours he’s discovered that he has super strength and his classmate is secretly a masked vigilante flame-throwing superhero, so he shrugs and says he’s just tired.</p>
            </blockquote>





	tonight the foxes hunt the hounds

**Author's Note:**

  * For [goinghost](https://archiveofourown.org/users/goinghost/gifts).



> sorry, but every fandom needs a superhero au. i don't make the rules.
> 
> for the lovely caden, my partner in crime-fighting and kc fangirling!

It’s really not Carter’s fault that he gets landed in a situation that bad, except for the part where it kind of is. He really should have known better than to stay at the library until closing—and maybe, he thinks, he should have called a cab to get home instead of walking.

He won’t take all the blame, though. What are the odds of a supervillain attacking an apartment complex _right_ as he’s walking past?

He’s smart about it, at least, because he has the good sense to duck into a doorway and shut up. The last thing he needs is some megalomaniac on super-steroids singling him out to pick on. Fortunately for Carter, the megalomaniac seems mostly focused on destroying the apartment building—from the top down, which in Carter’s opinion seems a little inefficient. He’s just started creeping around the building, hoping to make a tactical retreat through the alley, when a jet of flame lights up the night sky over his head.

He looks up just in time to see a slim figure in black leap onto the apartment building’s rooftop from a neighboring complex, shooting fire as it goes. As _she_ goes, because between the flame-throwing stunt and the glint of gold on her hood, there is literally only one person it could be.

He can’t see what Pyroa does after her jump, but she’s presumably beating up the villain on the rooftop, because Carter can hear the guy’s pained yelps from the ground. Whoever the guy is, he really needs to work on his hand-to-hand, because from what he can hear the fight’s over pretty quick. There are a few defiant shouts, a reedy voice screeching “You cannot defeat the mighty--!” and then a pained squeak that Carter _really_ hopes signifies Pyroa punching him in the mouth.

Then—something happens, he can’t see what, but the whole building shudders and a decorative gargoyle perched on the roof twenty stories above Carter’s head rocks back and forth ominously before toppling towards him.

He has a second to think, _Oh, I’m screwed,_ and then ducks his head as he throws his hands up, like that’ll actually stop several hundred pounds of rock headed for his skull.

Except—he realizes after a few moments of not being a human pancake—it does.

His head is spinning a little bit and he feels like he’s either going to faint or vomit, but as the adrenaline starts to clear his head he hears a scuffling sound, and when he looks up Pyroa is rushing down the fire escape towards him. She jumps the last three flights of stairs and comes out of a roll facing him, hands outstretched to help, and then freezes, and even though Carter can’t see her face he can make an educated guess that she’s staring at the _massive concrete statue he is holding above his head._

“Uh,” he says helpfully.

Pyroa’s head snaps down to look at him, and then as police sirens wail in the distance she spins on her heel and sprints into the darkness.

Carter figures she’s got the right idea. He dumps the gargoyle and runs eight blocks home.

*#*#*

Of course Carter knows about Pyroa. Everyone and their _grandmother_ has known about Pyroa since she started roaming the city about two years ago. She’d made her first appearance in an unadorned black sweatshirt and jeans, blasting rubble out of the doorway of a collapsing building and allowing the panicked citizens to escape. Headlines across the country had screamed about the “human flamethrower” for weeks, even after she didn’t appear again; somehow the name “Pyroa” was coined and the next thing Brooklyn knew it was housing its very own superhero.

The world had gone nuts over Pyroa. She’d made a second appearance singeing the pants off of a jewelry thief, this time decked out in billowy black pants and a fancy new hoodie—the hood looked like something out of Assassin’s Creed, with gold filigree on the tip that hung down over her face, and there was a fabric attachment in the front that stretched up over her face, hiding everything but her eyes. Within a month she had her own comic series; Penelope “Penny” Pyroa was a feisty twenty-something redhead with brilliant green eyes—even though no one actually knew what color Pyroa’s eyes were—who worked as an innocuous secretary by day and donned a sexy catsuit by night to fight crime. Penny Pyroa’s signature move was kicking her opponents in the face with her black stiletto heel after dropping a sassy one-liner—even though, to Carter’s knowledge, the real Pyroa had never spoken, and he was also fairly sure she wore combat boots.

*#*#*

Carter didn’t sleep the night after the gargoyle incident. He’d been too busy hyperventilating, and then after he calmed down, testing his new apparent super strength. He could bench press his solid oak desk without breaking a sweat.

He’s understandably out of it the next day at school, which is why he doesn’t realize the teacher’s ordered them to pair up in first period English until he looks up and realizes he doesn’t have a partner.

He feels a tap on his shoulder, and a quiet voice says, “Looks like we’re the only ones left.”

Carter finds himself staring up at Zia Rashid. He knows her in the same vague way he knows most of his classmates—name, face, a few long-suffering looks across the room when AP testing gets brought up. She’s mostly distinguished by the tips of her hair dyed dark blue and the multitude of piercings in the rim of her ear.

“Okay,” he says, and then Zia leads him to the classroom door. “I like working in the hallway,” she explains. “Gets too loud in here.”

The teacher gives them a flippant handwave of permission, and Zia leads him out to sit on the tile floor with their backs resting on a bank of lockers. Carter sets his worksheet across his knees and says, “So on the first question—“

 _“What_ were you thinking?” Zia hisses in his ear, and when he looks up she seems angry enough to spit.

“Uh,” he manages, eloquently. “The worksheet—“

“Do you realize how _unbelievably stupidly lucky_ you are that I’m the only one who saw you do that last night?”

“Last—“ he starts, and then the pieces click together in his head. “Oh my god. Oh my _god,_ you’re Py—?“

“Don’t say the P-word!” she spits. _“Yes,_ and you could’ve gotten caught last night.”

“It was an accident!” Carter protests. “I didn’t even _know_ I could do that.”

“An—actually, someone’s going to overhear us,” Zia says, apparently calming down. “I’ll find you at lunch, then we’ll talk.”

After that she pointedly refrains from verbal responses not directly related to their worksheet.

Whatever was left of Carter’s focus goes out the window through his next three classes, and his Physics teacher actually asks him if he needs to go to the nurse, with a concerned little “You’re looking peaky, dear!” He can’t think of a delicate way to tell her that he’s probably gone into shock because in the last twenty-four hours he’s discovered that he has super strength _and_ his classmate is secretly a masked vigilante flame-throwing superhero, so he shrugs and says he’s just tired.

When fourth period ends, dismissing the juniors and seniors to lunch, Carter’s at his locker just long enough to dump his textbook before Zia appears at his shoulder, saying, “Come on, I’ll take you out to lunch so we can talk about our English project.”

“Um—alright,” he says, grabbing his jacket. Even though the students are allowed to leave campus for lunch, he’s never actually taken advantage of this privilege. “But I don’t have a car, so—“

“I do,” Zia assures him. “But we’re just going down the street; it’ll be faster to walk.”

The hallways are too loud for conversation, so Carter waits until they’re outside before he says, “How—“

“Don’t talk about it here,” Zia warns in a low voice. “Wait until we’re inside.”

“I was just asking how you knew where my locker was,” he says.

Zia rolls her eyes. “I’m familiar with the alphabet, Carter.”

The lockers in the senior hallway are organized by last name. _Duh._ Carter manages to refrain from smacking himself, but only just.

\--

Zia’s destination is a small, greasy-looking bakery and café a five minute walk from the school building. A neon sign over the door reads _Carl’s_ in flowing red script, but the lights in the _l_ have burned out, so it spells out _Cars._

The inside of Carl’s restaurant reminds Carter of the school cafeteria—a long metal rail in front of a glass pane, where he can see a small handful of students and an elderly couple scooting along plastic trays and pointing out various side dishes to a friendly-looking man, who heaps food onto their plates before passing it over the counter. Over the register hangs a chalkboard menu, announcing the day’s main courses, and Carter quickly revises his assessment—school food doesn’t sound _or_ smell nearly as good as Carl’s.

When they approach the counter, the friendly guy—presumably Carl—smiles. “Zia!” he says. “Haven’t seen you here in a while!”

“I’ve been using my lunch breaks to study lately,” she says, returning his smile.

“What, and you can’t study here with good food?” he demands. “I’m hurt, Zia.”

“Sincerest apologies,” she laughs.

Their food is handed to them straight from the grill by a gray-haired woman, who compliments Zia on her industrial ear piercing—a recent addition, apparently—and after Zia pays (swatting Carter’s hand away from his pocket when he tries to bring out his own wallet) they settle down in a corner booth.

“Correct me if I’m wrong,” Zia says around a mouthful of roast beef sandwich, “but what you were trying to tell me earlier is that you had no idea you had superhuman abilities until last night?”

“Basically,” Carter agrees as he tucks into his grilled cheese. “Can’t say I’d ever tried lifting a stone statue before.”

“I figured as much,” she says. “It’s just—usually, I mean, people like us start noticing our abilities when littler things manifest. Odd talents.”

“People like us?” he asks. “There are more?”

Zia nods. “Just a few that I know of. Generally we choose to keep quiet. My first stunt was actually mostly an accident,” she admits. “And after the media circus I decided I might as well do what I could as long as I had a decent excuse not to hide. You know the rest.”

Carter thinks that _you know the rest_ is a pretty blasé way of describing becoming a national icon overnight, but he files that away for later. “So…what do you mean, _odd talents?”_

“Small gifts,” Zia says. “Nothing extremely remarkable on their own. I suppose you could consider them bonus powers. I know a young man who is pretty much immune to cold weather.”

“And what’s his, uh, main superpower?” Carter asks.

“Communing with the dead,” Zia says, sounding unimpressed. “Among other necromancy-related things.”

“Sounds like a fun guy,” he mumbles into his ginger ale.

“He is,” she promises. “Very good at basketball, too. But lots of us have little gifts. I don’t need more than a couple hours of sleep each night. Surely you have something like that.”

Which, Carter thinks, explains how she can balance being a straight-A honors student _and_ fighting crime. But he can’t think of anything special off the top of his head—except: “I’ve always had a pretty good memory,” he says. “I mean, patterns and stuff are really easy. And I can memorize whole chapters of books if I read through them a few times.”

“Enhanced memory,” she says, nodding. “That could be very useful. Anything else?”

“Uh, I have fifteen-twenty vision?” he says. “But so does my sister, and my mom had really good eyesight too. I think our ancestors ate too many carrots.”

Zia snorts into the last of her potato salad. “We should be getting back,” she says.

They’re both quiet on the walk back to school, but Carter spends most of the time turning a thought over and over in his head, poking it like a loose tooth. Finally, just outside the gate, he asks, “So…how exactly does one become a superhero?”

Zia flashes him a wicked grin. “Thought you’d never ask.”

\--

Carter isn’t sure what to expect of Zia’s car—although he can’t shake the image of something like the Batmobile from his mind—but it turns out that she is the somewhat chagrined owner of an extremely rusty pickup truck. The seat upholstery is ripped to all hell and the radio doesn’t work, but, as Zia points out, at least it gets good mileage.

During the ride to Zia’s house, she pops in a noise rock CD and Carter steadfastly ignores his cell phone chiming, because he’s already gotten enough crap from Sadie this afternoon about going home with a girl. Instead he reclines his head back and closes his eyes, listening to the jangling noise from the speakers and inhaling the faint scent of cinnamon that he’s noticed seems to perpetually hang around Zia.

He doesn’t realize he’s started to doze off until Zia taps his arm impatiently and says, “We’re here.”

They’ve pulled up to a weathered brownstone on a quiet street that looks vaguely familiar. It takes Carter a moment to place the memory. “Hey, I live a couple of blocks from here,” he says. “Mom used to take Sadie and me to the park around the corner when we were little.”

Zia hums in acknowledgement as she kills the engine and retrieves her bag from the backseat. Then she leads him up the stairs, pausing to unlock the door with a jingle of keys and stepping inside with a shout of _“Ahlan, baba!”_

Carter hears an answering greeting from somewhere inside the house, and then he pauses to pull off his shoes as Zia drops her boots under the coat rack.

“I brought a friend,” Zia adds as she leads Carter down the hall into a sitting room containing a comfy-looking loveseat and one overstuffed armchair. Sitting in the chair is one of the frailest-looking old men Carter has ever seen. But the old man has a bright smile for Zia, who leans down to let him kiss the top of her head before saying, _“Baba,_ this is Carter Kane. Carter, this is my grandfather.”

“I am Iskandar,” the old man says, offering a hand that Carter takes gingerly—honestly the guy looks like he might snap in half. “I have a first name, of course, but many people do not bother with it anymore. Zia, did you offer our guest a drink?”

“No,” she says over her shoulder as she strides out of the room. “Carter, tea?”

“Manners,” Iskandar scolds quietly.

Zia reappears in the doorway, clearly at the end of a fondly exasperated eyeroll. “I’m sorry. Carter, our _dearly_ honored guest, would you like some tea?”

“Sure,” he says—he doesn’t like tea much, but he’s still standing stiffly in the middle of the sitting room. “Er—yes, please. Thank you.”

Iskandar gestures to the loveseat. “Have a seat,” he says, “I promise I do not bite. I cannot make such promises for my granddaughter, however,” he adds, chuckling.

Carter is mercifully spared from responding when Zia reappears, carrying a dented tray with three steaming mugs. “Don’t scare him, _baba,_ he’s new,” she says as she hands Iskandar a mug. She passes Carter his drink and then drops into her seat next to him, sitting cross-legged with her feet tucked under her. (Her socks, Carter notices, are baby blue with _fuck off_ cross-stitched in white.)

They drink in silence. Carter finds that he actually likes the tea; it’s much better than the watery instant junk that Sadie makes at home. After he drains his mug, Zia unfolds herself gracefully from the cushions. “We’re going upstairs,” she tells Iskandar, beckoning for Carter to follow.

“Ah,” Iskandar says with a sly grin. “He is a _special_ friend?”

“Yes,” Zia says, and Carter hopes to whatever gods are listening that he’s not blushing as he trails after her.

Zia takes the wooden stairs almost at a run, while Carter chooses to climb with a careful walk while his socks slide on the hardwood. “So when your grandpa says _special friend—“_ he starts.

Zia’s voice reverberates down the stairwell. “Don’t get any ideas, Kane,” she warns.

The second floor looks more like a storage area than actual living space; furniture is shoved in the corners and along the walls, looking mostly disused, and there are cardboard boxes piled at random. Then Zia turns and leads him into what looks like it might have once been an office, or maybe a sunroom, but it’s full of mats and workout equipment, as well as a fire extinguisher and a bucket of sand that Carter nearly trips over on his way in.

“Those get used a lot?” he asks, rubbing his toes where he stubbed them on the bucket.

“Hmm? Oh, no, not in years. I just had lots of…accidents when I was younger.”

“I’ll bet,” he mutters. “So this is your lair? Looks kind of sunny for a Batcave.”

“Funny,” Zia mutters drily. “Iskandar has trouble with stairs, and since I spend most of my time in my room—“ here she gestures vaguely towards the ceiling “—there was really nothing else to put here. So Iskandar told me I should start training.”

“He knows?” Carter asks. “About the fire stuff?”

“Of course he knows,” she says. “And he knows about Pyroa. He knows a few others, too; sometimes we’ll have little meetings.”

“Special friends,” Carter says. “Like the necromancer guy.”

“Like him,” Zia nods.

“Do I know this guy?”

Zia shrugs. “He’s older than us, but you might. I’ll ask him if he would like to meet you. First, however,” she says as she strips off her socks and leather jacket, “you need to build up your strength. Two hundred sit-ups.”

“Uh,” he says, “isn’t that a little redundant for me?”

Zia shoves his shoulder, hard, and he hits the ground flailing. “Your core is weak, but if you think that’s too easy, make it four hundred. Better get started, Kane.”

\--

By the time Carter leaves, his limbs feel like they’re made of pudding, and he’s already regretting offering to walk home. Zia—unfairly—looks like she took a refreshing walk in the park, despite the fact that Carter has watched her do a disturbing number of push-ups.

She walks him to the door, and he hesitates at the threshold. “So,” he starts, “this was fun. I mean—it was painful. But fun. I had fun,” he finishes, grimacing.

Zia smiles. “So did I,” she says. “See you at school.” And with that she shuts the door.

Carter’s dad is waiting at the kitchen table when he gets home. “How was your date?” he asks, not looking up from the pile of papers in front of him—Carter has heard him grumbling about editing a textbook for the last few weeks.

 _“Dad,”_ he groans. “It wasn’t a _date._ We barely know each other.” It’s true, Carter realizes with a jolt; he can’t recall saying two words to Zia before this morning, and now he feels like she knows him better than any of his other friends.

“So what did you do for three hours?” his dad asks, scribbling a note in the margins.

“English homework,” Carter tells him, which is also true; he pulls out his much-annotated photocopy of _Anthem_ as evidence. “Then Zia bet she could do more sit-ups than me,” he adds, to explain his sweat-soaked shirt.

“And?”

“I’m pretty sure she was an Olympic athlete in another life,” Carter admits. “Lesson learned.”

His dad’s laughter follows Carter all the way up the stairs.

*#*#*

Carter’s muscles ache so badly the next morning that he can barely climb out of bed. He spends his entire morning dreading third hour gym, and when he walks in and sees an army officer in fatigues he actually _whines._ Zia, who by rights shouldn’t be able to hear him at the other end of the bleachers, shoots him a glance and smirks. He’s almost sure he can hear her laughing at him while they’re doing planks.

Zia finds him in the lunch line, slipping behind him at the sandwich counter and asking, “Care to join me for lunch?”

Carter glances across the room to his usual table, which has already been overrun by a group of noisy freshmen. “Sure,” he says, with some relief.

Zia leads him to a table near the cafeteria doors, nestled next to the window wall that overlooks the atrium. The only other occupant is a timid-looking junior whose face is nearly hidden between her long hair and her book, but Carter is still pretty sure he recognizes her from somewhere. Zia introduces her only as “Cleo,” who glances at Carter and confirms “We had World History together last year” before returning to her book.

 _“Now_ I remember you,” Carter says. “You always won all of the review games.”

Cleo flushes but doesn’t look up. “I like reading,” she murmurs.

“Cleo,” Zia says, leaning forward, “Carter is like us.”

Behind the fringe of her hair, Cleo’s eyes widen, and she immediately sets her book aside. “You’re sure?”

Zia nods. “I’ve seen him in action.”

Cleo turns on Carter, eyes bright. “So when did you figure out your powers? How did they manifest? Do you think they’ve left any lasting physical impressions? Could you think of any external catalysts? Actually—first, what is it that you _do?_ Don’t answer yet, I want to write this down.” She starts digging through her backpack.

“Let him breathe,” Zia says, and then turns to Carter, whose mouth is hanging open. “Cleo loves doing research; she’s trying to find out what causes abilities like ours to form, or ways to ‘diagnose’ others like us.”

“Zia thinks it’s magic,” Cleo adds from where she’s burrowed into her bag, “but magic is really just science we don’t understand yet, isn’t it?”

“She is also,” Zia drawls, “a big believer in the scientific method.”

“The answers to everything are waiting to be found, if we do enough testing,” Cleo says, finally emerging with a black Moleskine notebook. She produces a small silver key on a chain from around her neck, and unlatches the lock on the cover, opening to a blank page and carefully printing _CARTER KANE_ at the top. Carter can see half a dozen pages with pen impressions on the back. “Now,” she says, “what’s your superpower?”

Zia nods encouragingly, so Carter says, “Uh, I’m apparently freakishly strong? But _someone,”_ he adds pointedly, “still thinks I need to work out.”

“Don’t feel bad, Zia will take any excuse to play drill sergeant,” Cleo says, adding _super strength_ under Carter’s name. “It’s one of her hobbies.”

“If you don’t mind me asking, what’s your gig?” Carter asks.

Cleo, somewhat unexpectedly, flushes again. “You’ll laugh at me.”

“I won’t,” Carter promises.

“I have—well. Um. Laser vision, only they’re kind of wimpy lasers and I have to take my glasses off to use them and then I can’t see where I’m aiming, and obviously contact lenses are out of the question—stop laughing!”

“Not at you,” he says, snorting into his hand. “Just, you kind of single-handedly destroyed every super hero stereotype in existence.”

Cleo clears her throat and turns back to her notebook. “So when did you discover your super strength?”

“The other day,” Carter says, unwrapping his ham and cheese and taking a casual bite while Cleo blanches.

“I didn’t believe him either,” Zia reassures her. “Quite frankly, I’m not sure _how_ he went so long without realizing he’s super-strong.”

“Do _you_ go around juggling stone statues for fun?” Carter asks. Zia shrugs and makes a noncommittal noise.

“Any other gifts?” Cleo asks as she scribbles.

“Enhanced memory,” Zia tells her around a mouthful of potato chips. “Possibly enhanced eyesight, although from the sounds of it that might just be good genetics.”

“What about you?” Carter asks as Cleo continues writing.

“Speed reading,” she says absently as she continues down the page. “I can process eight hundred words per minute.”

“We call her the super scientist,” Zia adds with a smirk.

Cleo has homeroom for the last fifteen minutes of lunch, but as she packs her bag she asks Zia, “Your place tonight?”

“Can’t, it’s Thursday,” Zia says. “Our friend the necromancer said he’d come over tomorrow, though.”

“Oh, you mean— _oh,”_ Cleo says. “Okay, do you want me to get the nurse then?”

“If you would please,” Zia nods, and then Cleo dashes off.

“What’s so special about Thursdays?” Carter asks after she’s gone. “Regularly scheduled sneaky superhero shenanigans?”

Zia doesn’t even pretend to be amused as she wads up her trash and says, “No, colorguard practice. I spend three hours twice a week using rifles in an extremely unsafe manner.”

*#*#*

Carter discovers on Friday when he sees Zia lugging her equipment bag around that her rifle is actually made of wood and covered in electrical tape, so he figures she was kidding about the extremely unsafe part. He’s not sure he trusts her with the six-foot metal flagpole, though. Carter knows he deserves the punch he gets when he tells her as much.

When she deposits her equipment bag inside her front door, Iskandar greets them both by calling, “Your friends are upstairs, Zia.”

“Thank you, _baba,”_ she yells back as they make their way down the hallway.

Carter expects Zia’s mystery super-buddies to be waiting in the room with all the workout equipment, so he’s shocked when she breezes past the second floor. He follows her up to the third floor—the attic, he guesses—and they step through the door and into Zia’s room.

He’s really not sure what he’s expecting of Zia’s private space, but it’s not this. There’s a stereo system set up on one wall, surrounded by stacks of CDs, and next to it stand two tall bookshelves overflowing with titles in multiple languages—Carter recognizes English and Arabic, but he’s pretty sure there are some French novels mixed in there—and there’s a long mahogany desk on the opposite wall, littered with jumbled papers and miscellaneous office supplies. The walls are painted navy blue and the bay window at the back of the room is framed by gold curtains.

The back quarter of the room is slightly raised, with a single step between the level changes. There are shelves set into the front—stuffed with even more books and some unlabeled storage tubs—and on the platform sits Zia’s bed, shoved into a corner and piled high with blankets and pillows. The foot of her bed runs up right next to the window, and the nightstand there holds a pair of dirty mugs—Carter can imagine her curled up in the window at night, tea steaming in her hand while she keeps a vigil over the neighborhood.

“Excuse the mess, but I pretty much live up here,” Zia says, shoving the wardrobe door shut as she passes. The door’s prevented from latching by what Carter realizes is the Pyroa costume, thrown carelessly over the top of the door.

Zia strides into the center of the room and sits cross-legged on a rug in the middle of the hardwood floor, which is already occupied by three other kids, all staring up at Carter.

“Hi,” he says uneasily.

Cleo is there, her trusty Moleskine open in her lap, and to her left are two people Carter vaguely remembers. There’s a boy in basketball shorts and an Avenged Sevenfold t-shirt—thin clothes for the chilly weather outside, so Carter figures this has to be the weather-impervious necromancer—and a girl that he remembers watching with the varsity cheer squad during assemblies the previous year.

“Walt Stone,” the boy introduces himself, nodding at Carter.

“And I’m Jaz,” the girl says with a friendly smile, leaning up to shake Carter’s hand. “You’re Carter Kane.”

“Zia told you about me?” he asks, a little stunned.

“Not your name,” Jaz admits. “I just always seem to know people’s names. It’s one of my talents.”

“And people call _me_ the freak,” Walt muses. Jaz pouts at him.

“Have a seat,” Zia tells Carter, and he chooses a spot between her and Cleo, completing the super circle.

“Hold on,” Walt says, and stands, crossing over to Zia’s bed and grabbing an armful of throw pillows. “If we’re going to look like we’re summoning something from the depths of some hell dimension, let’s do it in comfort.”

Zia glares. “Of course you may trash my room, Walter, thank you _so_ much for asking.”

“You know my name’s not Walter,” he says, dumping his load in the middle of the circle. “Besides, it’s not like you need _help_ making a mess up here.”

Zia chucks a pillow at him, and in an instant they’re rolling across the floor, wrestling while their laughter echoes off the walls.

“Ignore them,” Jaz says, “they do this all the time.”

“Have we met before?” Carter asks.

“I think we had the same Trig class,” she says. “I’m at SUNY now. Walt’s going to Pratt.”

“The liberal arts school?”

“Design major,” Jaz confirms. “He makes jewelry.”

A few feet away, Carter can hear Walt being both liberal and artistic with his swears, possibly because Zia has him in a chokehold. “I can stop any time,” she says. “Just give up.”

Walt throws her, and their conversation devolves into muffled cursing again.

“So what’s your specialty?” Carter asks.

Jaz brightens up immediately. “Healing,” she says. “I mean, obviously I have limitations. I can’t bring back the dead or anything; that’s part of Walt’s package,” she clarifies. “And I can’t reverse anything major—like brain damage—immediately. But I can usually stabilize bad injuries, and little things like abrasions or broken bones are easy fixes. I’m pretty good with the stomach flu, too.”

“It looks like Walt’s getting his ego bruised pretty badly,” Carter observes, as Zia whoops and pins Walt to the floor. “Anything you can do about that?”

“The remains of what may have been his ego are simply too mangled to identify,” Jaz sighs. “Nothing to be done.”

“Uncle! Uncle!” Walt chokes, slapping the floor. Zia climbs off him and settles next to Carter, brushing the dust off her leather jacket with a satisfied smirk.

“Did you enjoy yourself?” Carter asks.

“Immensely,” Zia says.

“If you two are quite finished,” Jaz says, “we were in the middle of introductions?”

“Of course,” Zia nods. “Carter Kane. Super strong. Super memory. Possibly super excellent eyesight, or he may have eaten too many carrots as a child.” She pauses for a moment, then adds, “Can’t do a decent push-up to save his life.”

“We all know you’ll whip him into shape, Officer Rashid,” Walt says.     

“Naturally,” Zia agrees. “You all know me. Jaz, healing, professional mind reader in her spare time—“

“Just names,” Jaz reminded her.

“Walt Stone, necromancy and some handy weather-resistant capabilities. Cleo, laser vision that we don’t talk about and speed reading.”

The girls nod at Zia, and a slight flush crawls up Cleo’s cheeks at the mention of her laser vision.

“Carter’s going to be joining me,” Zia says, offhand, and Jaz chokes on air.

“Sorry?” she coughs, and Cleo has looked up from her notebook to stare dumbfounded at both of them and Walt looks about ten seconds from calling an institution, _Hello, my friend has suddenly lost her mind._

“Uh,” Carter says, “is that not normal?”

 _“No,”_ Cleo says, a forceful slap of a syllable, and Walt shakes his head emphatically and adds “Not at all.”

“Think about it, Carter,” Jaz says gently. “What could the rest of us do? I’m not a hero. I’m not built to be running around the city beating up muggers or whatever else. Cleo—sure, she has fantastic powers, but she can’t use them without hurting herself. And Walt’s—“ Jaz swallows the rest of her sentence, glancing apologetically at Walt.

“Textbook supervillain,” Walt says, his eyes shuttered off. “Yeah. I know.”

“Zia’s an anomaly,” Jaz says. “Most of the people like us wouldn’t dare expose ourselves like that. Look at all of the uproar she’s caused by herself. Can you even _imagine_ what would happen if more of us revealed what we could do?”

Carter glances over at Zia. She’s staring intently at a patch of floor in front of her, jaw clenched, fists resting on her knees.

“Look,” he decides. “I get it. It’s totally reasonable that you guys don’t want to get involved in the masked vigilante thing. I respect that. But I _want_ to do this.”

Zia doesn’t look at him, but her fists loosen and the white fades from her knuckles.

“Okay,” Cleo says, “what now?”

Zia shrugs. “Now we wait.”

“For what?” Cleo asks.

Zia rolls her eyes. “For some B-grade wannabe villain to do something stupid. In the meantime, I don’t know. Maybe I’ll teach Carter here how to actually do a sit-up instead of that lazy cheater pseudo-crunch you keep doing in P.E.”

“Hey!” Carter says, and Cleo laughs herself into a coughing fit.

*#*#*

At lunch the next day, Zia’s phone lights up with a text from “Drop Dead Hottie”. When Carter raises his eyebrow, she says, “The next time Walt changes his name in my contacts list, I’m going to knock his teeth out.”

She opens the message, and the scowl that immediately follows makes Carter wonder if she’s going to rearrange Walt’s dental work anyway, but then she buries her face in her hands and mutters “I cannot _believe_ he actually pays money for that garbage.”

Carter sneaks a peek at her phone screen, which is displaying a picture of the latest Pyroa comic and the caption _# of times penny flirted w her boss unnecessarily in this one: i don’t think u want to know._

“God, those comics suck,” Carter says. “He seriously reads them?”

“Just so he can make fun of me,” Zia mumbles. “Ugh, I _hate_ them. I don’t know why anyone even reads those.”

“People read them because everyone wants to know about Pyroa,” Carter says with a shrug. Zia cocks an eyebrow at him, and he adds, “What, it’s true! I keep hearing rumors about one of the comic writers knowing Pyroa’s _true identity_ or whatever.”

“Obviously not true,” Zia says. “Did you hear anything about the staff?”

Carter vaguely remembers something about Pyroa and a wooden staff, but nothing beyond the basic recognition comes to mind, so he shakes his head.

“Walt told me that the really early comics said that Pyroa’s staff was the source of all her power,” Zia explains. “I mean, I just kept the thing around because it was nice to have something to hit people with, but—well, it was such a perfect opportunity to fuck with the writers, I couldn’t resist.”

“What did you do?” Carter asks.

“Broke it in half over my knee,” Zia snickers. “Publicly. Apparently the backpedaling in the comic story was incredible.”

Carter laughs so hard that he almost chokes on his water.

\--

They’re walking to Zia’s car after school when she suddenly says, “Thank you.”

“What for?” Carter asks, startled.

“Earlier,” Zia says. “You kept saying _Pyroa._ Not _you.”_

Carter tries to ignore the blush creeping up his neck. “Um—well, you’re not Pyroa. You’re Zia.”

She squeezes his arm before unlocking the truck.

*#*#*

Carter’s opportunity to fight his very first bad guy comes when, go figure, he’s walking home from the library.

He’s psyching himself up to scale the fire escape when a black clad figure careens around the corner and straight into him.

Carter hits the ground hard, and he hears Zia mutter, “We have got to stop meeting like this.” She extends a hand to pull him back to his feet and observes him with amber eyes glimmering under her Pyroa hood. “All yours,” she says, nodding at the building. “I’ll be your backup if you’d like.”

“You should take care of it,” he says, as the would-be-villain cackles somewhere above.

“No,” she says, and Carter swears he can _hear_ her smirk, “I want to watch this.” Then, almost as an afterthought, “Keep your face covered.”

He pulls up his hood and yanks the drawstrings tight before eyeing the wall. He can make the jump to the fire escape easy; Zia’s been testing the limits of how far his super strength will propel him. But…

“You’ll be quite noisy,” Zia warns him, almost as if she can tell what he’s thinking. “He’ll hear you coming a mile off. Any other way up?”

“Look, I already took a critical thinking test in Physics today, Sergeant Rashid,” he mutters, but she’s right and he knows it. He also knows that she’s probably figured out every conceivable way he can make it to the roof, and he knows that she’s _definitely_ playing with him.

“Any day now,” Zia says.

“The windows,” he decides. “I can climb the window ledges. They’re wide enough to give me a grip and they’re not so far apart that I can’t jump the gaps.”

“Excellent,” she agrees, and he swears she’s smiling now. “Now, how am _I_ going to get to the roof? I don’t do windows.”

He drops to one knee and weaves his fingers together to form a good foothold. “Want a lift to the fire escape?” he asks.

She runs and propels herself off his hands without another word, snagging the bottom of the metal platform and swinging herself over the railing much more gracefully than he ever could. He starts to climb.

The concrete ledges are rough and rub the pads of his fingers raw, but he’s making good time—better time than Zia, who has to creep slowly to avoid rattling the rusty joints of the fire escape. He falls into a rhythm as he alternates hand and footholds: pull, jump, pull, jump, over and over until he’s hanging on to the edge of the roof.

When he glances down, Zia waves at him to keep going.

Carter swings himself over the edge of the roof to confront the guy who appears to be rigging up explosives next to the stairwell. “Drop the—whatever you’re holding,” he warns.

The dude startles and turns around. “Who are you?” he demands.

Carter actually hasn’t thought this far ahead. “Um—I’m here to stop you!” he shouts.

“Right,” the guys says. “Look, kid, I’ve got a gun and police response times in Brooklyn are disappointingly slow, so I’d scram if I were you.”

Carter’s flailing for a dignified response when Zia interrupts with a polite cough.

He glances behind him to see that she’s perched on the low brick wall that edges the rooftop, legs crossed delicately at the ankles, which looks kind of bizarre considering how intimidating she is in her Pyroa getup. She wiggles her fingers at the criminal in a gesture that says _Hello, pleasure to pulverize you._

“Okay, wow, I’m actually kind of impressed that you managed to get Pyroa,” the guy admits. “But I hope you realize she can’t do anything without blowing all of us sky high.”

Zia inclines her head towards one of the stone gargoyles adorning the wall, and even without speaking Carter understands her hint.

“That’s fine,” he says, and hefts one of the statues single-handedly. “How are you at dodgeball?”

*#*#*

Carter gets home late that night with bloody and bruised knuckles, and when he wakes up in the morning the internet seems to have exploded.

“So did you hear that Pyroa got herself a sidekick?” Sadie asks him when he sits down at the breakfast table.

“You never know,” Carter’s dad says from over by the sink, “maybe Pyroa _is_ the sidekick.”

Back in the living room, the news is showing security camera footage of Carter fighting with the would-be bomber while Zia looks on approvingly. “Nah,” he says. “I mean, look, this guy clearly has no idea what he’s doing. He’s definitely the sidekick.”

“Told you,” Sadie says, and takes another bite of waffle.

The hallways at school are buzzing about the new superhero. _Did you see that guy on the news? Yeah! And the way he punched that other guy? Yeah!_

He and Zia share a _Can you believe these guys?_ look across the room in English, and that’s the most either of them say about it until lunch.

Cleo has her nose buried in her laptop at the lunch table, but she says, “Saw you on the news last night. I’d love to steal you sometime to help me rearrange my furniture.”

Zia wraps both of her arms around Carter’s shoulders and says, “Mine. You can’t have him.”

Carter’s ears heat up as he says, “I charge by the hour for household chores. What are you reading?”

Cleo turns the computer to show him the screen, an online article with the headline _BROOKLYN’S NEW SUPER-SAVIOR: WHO IS FALCON THUNDER?_

“No,” Carter moans as Zia cackles into his shoulder, “please tell me this is a joke.”

“Sorry,” Cleo says, sounding distinctly unapologetic. “Apparently there were a bunch of people who wanted to call you ‘Falcon’ because, you know, falcon punch, but since there’s already a superhero named Falcon I guess they had to settle for something a little more ridiculous.”

“But where did they _get_ that?” he balks.

“Probably off of an online name generator,” Zia says. “That’s where Pyroa originated, you know. I just have better luck than you.”

“Next time,” Carter promises, “I’m sticking a _Hello, my name is Fire Gal_ nametag on your outfit.”

“Your funeral,” Cleo and Zia say in unison.

*#*#*

Pyroa and Falcon Thunder continue to guard the streets of Brooklyn from crimes both big and small well into January.

Zia starts winterguard, Carter’s English grade doesn’t take a nosedive—for once—and he mostly has Zia to thank for that. Cleo and Walt make a feathered mask that looks about as ridiculous as _Falcon Thunder_ sounds, and he wears it with love.

The Pyroa comic writers practically do backflips at Falcon Thunder’s appearance—Penny Pyroa is sidelined for her office boss, a buff middle-aged white dude with a secret identity who has, apparently, been ordering around his secretary the whole time. Walt takes a particular delight in teasing Carter about his fictional counterpart’s penchant for ripping open his shirt while changing into his super-gear (body armor and combat boots, despite the fact that Carter himself has only ever worn a plain black hoodie and track pants).

Zia usually takes whatever opportunity she can get to say she’s been meaning to try that trick, too, and comment on the various shades of red that Carter turns.

\--

Things with Zia have been…weird.

They’ve been hanging out a lot, but Carter figures that comes with the territory of being partners in crime-fighting. And he loves being around Zia. She’s funny and smart and more than a little terrifying (aside from being an actual human flamethrower, she is also a beast at dodgeball) and Carter’s starting to feel… _weird._

Sometimes Zia will get weirdly close—hugging him out of the blue like she did that one day at lunch, or she’ll lean on his shoulder, or cling to his arm, which normally wouldn’t make Carter think twice; he’s had some extremely cuddly friends in the past. It’s just that she does it _all the time._ And while normally Carter would like to think that he can take a hint, he can’t shake the constant reminder that he hasn’t actually known Zia that long. He doesn’t know if this is her regular way of showing friendly affection.

Besides, he thinks, even if he knew she wasn’t usually this hands-on in her friendships, he doubts his ability to ever pluck up the courage to _do_ anything.  

*#*#*

“Shh,” Zia says when Carter joins her on their favorite lookout rooftop. “Do you see that man? Dead ahead, on the balcony of the building with the rooftop garden.”

“Yes,” he whispers back. “What about him?”

“I can’t really see,” she breathes, “but I think he’s been staring at me.”

Carter squints. His eyesight is better than Zia’s, but the man in question is a little more than six blocks away, just a faceless shape down the street. He’s white and has light hair, but beyond that Carter can’t tell specifics. He might be staring at them, or across the street, or in the opposite direction, or he could be sleeping.

“I can’t tell,” he admits. “Too far away. But hey, if I can’t see him, there’s no way he can see us. We’re even sitting in the shadows.”

“He still gives me the—is ‘heebie-jeebies’ the phrase?” Zia murmurs.

“I know what you mean,” Carter says, because the man down the street is sitting so still, so alert, that chills run down his spine.

It’s ridiculous, and Carter knows he’s paranoid, but they both stick to the shadows instead of taking their usual leisurely obstacle course across the rooftops. Zia shivers and tugs on Carter’s arm until it’s tucked around her shoulders.

“How is it that _you_ of all people get cold so easily?” Carter demands.

“I am a delicate desert flower,” Zia deadpans, which is even funnier than usual coming from the depths of her murder hood. Then she just scoots closer until she can rest her head on his shoulder.

It’s really too cold for any ne’er-do-wells to be wreaking havoc in the streets, so they stay like that the rest of the night.

\--

It’s a little after two in the morning when Carter sneaks back into his house via his bedroom window, a journey he’s made dozens of times. He runs pretty much on autopilot, shutting the window quietly and draping his jacket over his desk chair—until he turns around to find his dad sitting on the edge of his bed.

“How nice of you to stop by,” his dad says. “Did you have fun while you were out?”

“Oh—uh—Dad, I,” Carter starts, with no idea how he’s going to finish his sentence, but his dad’s raised hand stops him.

“I’m not looking for excuses,” he says, and he doesn’t even sound _mad,_ just disappointed. “Are you going to tell me what you were doing?”

Carter’s mouth goes dry. “I can’t,” he says.

His dad nods. “I assumed as much. Just one more question, then: were you with Zia?”

Carter’s throat feels swollen, and his eyes prick in a way that means he’s on the verge of crying, a feeling he recognizes even though he hasn’t had a full-out sob fest in years. Not, he thinks, since the last time he got this look from his dad, when he broke half of his Hot Wheels as a kid after he got the news that his mom had died. “Yes,” he croaks. “I was.”

His dad closes his eyes. “You have school in the morning,” he finally says, “so we’ll discuss this further tomorrow. I don’t think I need to tell you how upset I am, Carter.” He sighs and opens his eyes. “For now, obviously, you’re grounded. You will go straight to school, and you will come straight home after. You will not accept rides from your _friends,”_ he says, unnervingly calm, “and Sadie will walk with you every day to make sure you do as you’re supposed to. You will do all of your school assignments in the kitchen or living room, not in your bedroom, and I reserve the right to check on you during the night to make sure you haven’t snuck out. And,” he says, “I’m taking your phone away indefinitely. You can keep your laptop for assignments, but I will be looking through your browser history. I can’t control what you do at school,” he finishes, “but I advise you find some friends who will have a better influence on you. Is that clear?”

Carter has to cough before he can speak. “Yes, sir,” he says.

His dad nods and stands. “That will be all for now. You have school in the morning. Go to bed.” With that, he walks out and shuts the door—not _slams,_ shuts. Carter hears another disappointed sigh before footsteps head away from his door.

Carter collapses onto his bed and stuffs his fist into his mouth, but he still can’t stifle the ugly sounds that come when the tears spill over.

*#*#*

He walks into first hour English approximately ten seconds before the final bell rings, and even though he can practically _smell_ Zia’s curious stare from across the room he doesn’t look up from his notebook the whole hour. She corners him outside the classroom as soon as the bell rings to dismiss them.

“I’m glad you made it home safe,” she says, her eyebrow piercing glinting as she wrinkles her forehead in genuine concern. “You didn’t answer my text messages.”

Carter opts for addressing the shoulder pad of her leather jacket rather than meeting her gaze. “Dad caught me sneaking in last night,” is all he says.

“Oh, Carter,” she says, and hugs him tight for a moment before saying, “You can tell me about it later, if you want. I have to get to class.” She gives his forearm a tight squeeze before hustling to the stairs.

Even though his limbs feel like lead, he manages to drag himself through third hour P.E, half-heartedly jogging laps around the gym while Zia keeps pace with him in silence. Fourth hour Physics passes in a blur that he can’t remember, although when he jerks back to awareness at the end of the hour, he has a page of notes in his notebook, so he figures he must have copied the lecture’s slideshow on autopilot. He shoves his notebook into his backpack and trudges to the cafeteria.

He’s thankful that Zia doesn’t bombard him with questions when he sits down. She just keeps working on her AP Calculus assignment while Carter nibbles at his sandwich without much enthusiasm. Cleo stares at both of them, curiosity evident, but she doesn’t say anything either, choosing instead to scan the notes in her Moleskine notebook.

Finally, Carter crumples up the wax paper from his sandwich and says, “So my dad caught me sneaking back in.” Zia sets down her pencil and Cleo closes her notebook. “I’m grounded. Obviously. No cell phone, no after school activities, and unofficially no talking to you guys. And there’s no way I’ll be able to leave at night anymore—he said he’s going to start checking up on me.”

Zia places her warm hand over his. “I’m sorry,” is all she says.

Cleo frowns. “So, what, no more Falcon Thunder?”

“Not until I can figure out how to get out of this,” Carter says.

“It’ll be okay,” Zia says. “You really are a good guy, Carter. Your dad will come around.”

“Let’s hope so,” he mutters.

\--

It’s probably too cold to be walking home from school, but Carter doesn’t own a car and Sadie can’t drive, so they bundle up in scarves and gloves and keep their faces down while they trudge home.

“For what it’s worth,” Sadie finally says, “I know you weren’t just sneaking out to fool around with Zia.”

“What?” Carter says.

“Oh, come on,” Sadie says, “you are the most straight-laced teenager on the _planet._ You’re too boring to go leaving the house in the middle of the night with no good reason.”

“Thanks,” he mutters. “I think.”

They walk I silence for a little bit until Sadie finally says, “Can you tell _me_ why you were sneaking out?”

“I can’t,” Carter says.

Sadie nods. “Okay.” After that they both stop talking, mostly because Carter can’t think of anything to say to that, but he pretends it’s because the cold makes his teeth ache.

\--

Carter finishes his homework early, tries (and mostly fails) to cook macaroni and cheese for dinner, and goes to bed at seven. He tells himself it’s because he’s been neglecting sleep lately and not because his dad is supposed to get home at seven-thirty.

His bedroom door creaks open a little before eight, but Carter’s too close to sleep to turn over and see what his dad wants. Instead he closes his eyes and waits for the door to close again and footsteps to fade down the hallway.

Even with his super vision, he can’t see much outside his bedroom window. He sends up a silent plea that Zia’s okay and falls asleep before his clock display clicks over to 08:15.

*#*#*

School is uneventful. At lunch, Zia gives Carter a rundown of last night’s criminal activity—which is to say _jack squat_ —and he gets texts from both Walt and Jaz saying that they’re sorry he can’t “do the super thing” anymore.

When he and Sadie get home, their dad is already back, working at the kitchen counter.

“Sadie,” their dad says, “could you give Carter and me a minute alone?”

Sadie clears out pretty fast, especially since Dad is wearing an expression that says he means business, and that business isn’t pleasant. He and Carter head for the living room. Dad claims the armchair, leaving Carter stranded in the middle of the sofa; across the room the TV is muted with a local news anchor talking about (according to the header) death penalty legislation. _Fitting,_ Carter thinks.

“Are you going to tell me why you were sneaking out?” is the first thing Dad asks.

“I can’t,” Carter says.

“Can’t or won’t?”

“Both,” Carter admits.

“I’m going out on a limb here, but Zia’s parents don’t know either?”

Carter swallows hard. “Zia doesn’t have parents. Her grandfather raised her. I don’t know how much he knows.”

“I suppose I’ll just have to ask.”

Flickers on the television screen catch Carter’s eye. There’s a grainy shot from what looks like a news chopper, showing a rooftop with a guy standing in the center of a huge storm. The man is wearing a pristine white suit and a red mask over his face, but his short blond hair is whipping in the wind that seems to be drawing storm clouds in from absolutely nowhere. The screen says the video is live footage.

“Carter, pay attention to me,” Dad says, but Carter doesn’t really hear because a black-clad figure leaps onto the rooftop with her fists blazing. Pyroa sends a white-hot fireball straight at the masked man, but the flames get sucked away by the wind.

“She needs help,” Carter murmurs. Then he shakes himself: “She needs help!” he yells, and bolts for his bedroom.

“Carter!” his dad shouts, but Carter slams the door and yanks his hoodie over his head, grateful that he hasn’t even had the time to take his shoes off yet. He snatches up his mask from its spot under his desk just as the door bangs open and his dad storms in.

“I’m so sorry, Dad!” he yells, and yanks the window open. He’s never done this before, but he’s only on the building’s second floor and his bones are supposed to be super strong to be able to support his super muscles—

He jumps from the window and crashes onto the sidewalk, stumbling but unhurt. He yanks the mask low over his face and takes off running.

He can see the storm clouds swirling a few blocks away—and the huge crowd filling the streets around the building. He leaps onto the nearest fire escape and runs to the roof. The buildings are farther apart here than he’s used to but he picked a high one to start from and besides, he’s probably got enough adrenaline in his system right now to kill an elephant, so he makes a couple of massive leaps and skids to a halt on Zia’s rooftop.

Carter can barely stand up, the winds are so strong, and Zia’s on her knees in the middle of a miniature tornado. She has both hands clutched around her throat and there’s no fire to be seen and he’s _suffocating her,_ she’s trapped in a vacuum and Carter’s going to kill this goon if it’s the last thing he does, he swears it.

“Hey!” he shouts, and the twister dissipates as the masked man turns to face Carter. Zia collapses and starts coughing, which at least means she’s conscious.

The masked man doesn’t look—well, okay, he doesn’t look much of anything with a mask on, but his stance is relaxed, not nervous or startled or angry or anything Carter expects. He just seems _bored._ He raises a hand like he’s going to wave, and Carter thinks, _crap._

A blast of wind knocks the breath from his lungs and his feet out from under him, and sends him skidding to the edge of the roof, then over the edge.

From somewhere above, he hears a shout and then there are hands under his arms, stopping his fall. Carter’s too disoriented to see who it is but it must be Zia, reaching over the edge of the roof, except when he can finally open his eyes he’s looking at the building’s façade as he’s being dragged back up and he fell _way_ too far for Zia to reach him.

Carter is deposited on the rooftop, and his rescuer kneels over him, peeking out from under a hood—really, what is it with heroes and hooded sweatshirts?

“Are you okay?” the hooded hero asks, and even though his vision is starting to swim Carter recognizes that face.

Sadie stands up and _literally_ flies towards the masked man, and Carter blacks out.

**Author's Note:**

> this is going to be a two-shot! the second part is probably not going to be as long as this one, because frankly a 20k two-shot would be unreasonably long. hopefully part 2 will not take 4 months to write but i make no promises.


End file.
